Gareth Williams

Curator of early Medieval coinage
Coinage of early Medieval Britain and Europe

Contact

Gareth Williams has been a curator at the Museum
since 1996, with responsibility for British and European coinage,
about AD 500 to about 1180. Within this area he specialises in
Anglo-Saxon and Viking coinage. Much of his work focuses on the use
of coinage as evidence within broader historical and archaeological
studies.

His wider research includes the history of the British Isles and
Scandinavia in the early Middle Ages, with particular interests in
different types of economy, medieval warfare and military
organization and the history and archaeology of the Vikings. He
also works on the history of cultural identities, with a particular
focus on the changing nature of British identity. A recent
direction in his research has been a focus on Viking camps in
England and Ireland in the late 9th century, and their role in the
development of towns in both countries.

He has strong interests in experimental archaeology, and has
been actively involved in historical re-enactment and historical
interpretation in character for several years. From 2002 to
2011 he also directed a collaborative research project on the
history of Tutbury Castle
in Staffordshire.

He is currently acting as guest curator for the exhibition
Viking Voyagers at the National Maritime Museum Cornwall
in Falmouth, 20 March 2015 to 22 February 2017.

Current projects

Viking Voyages

This exhibition has been developed by the National Maritime
Museum Cornwall, and includes objects from the collections of the
British Museum, the National Museum of Ireland, the National Museum
of Denmark and the Manx Museum, and will be open 20 March 2015 to
22 February 2017. The development of the exhibition has been
supported in part by the British Museum through the UK Partnerships
programme. The exhibition focuses on the maritime achievements of
the Vikings, which underpinned their extraordinary combination of
international conquest, trade and settlement. A secondary theme is
the interaction between the Vikings and different Celtic peoples,
from Scotland to Brittany via the Irish Sea and Cornwall

Viking Warfare and Military Organisation

This book will provide a general introduction to the history of
warfare in the Viking age, together with a detailed study of the
underlying systems of military organization and their broader links
to Viking society. The book will be completed in
2015.

The Vale of York Hoard and other Viking hoards
in Britain and Ireland

The Vale of York hoard, found in 2007, is the most important
Viking hoard found in Britain since 1840, with a mixture of coins,
ingots, intact ornaments and hack-silver (silver cut up for
bullion) all contained in a beautiful gilt-silver cup. A short book
for the non-specialist (co-authored with Barry Ager) has already
been published, and the hoard will also form the focus of a more
extensive research project and publication on Viking hoards from
Britain and Ireland.

Anglo-Saxon gold

This project looks at the use of coins in Anglo-Saxon England
from the 5th to the 7th centuries, against the background of a
wider study of the use of gold, and the nature of wealth in the
same period. This period is one in which coin use has traditionally
been seen as minimal, but this view has to be revised in the light
of steadily increasing numbers of both Anglo-Saxon and imported
gold coins uncovered through metal detecting. At the same time,
major discoveries such as the Staffordshire hoard and the elite
burial from Prittlewell, Essex raise important questions about
existing conceptions of wealth and status in the early Anglo-Saxon
period

Lenborough hoard

In December 2014, around 5,200 Anglo-Saxon silver pennies were
discovered, wrapped in lead, in a field near Lenborough in
Buckhinghamshire. The hoard was buried towards the end of the reign
of Cnut (1016-35), and is one of the largest hoards of Anglo-Saxon
coins ever found. The hoard is currently being recorded and
assessed as possible Treasure under the terms of the Treasure Act
(1996), and it is hoped that the hoard will eventually be acquired
by the Buckinghamshire County Museum.

Previous projects

World of Money CD-Rom, 1998

This CD provided an interactive guide to the history of money
throughout the world, and explored the nature of money as well as
how it has been made, saved, and used.

Paid in Burnt Silver: Wealth and Power in the
Viking Age, 2000

Temporary exhibition exploring the changing nature of wealth,
power and society in the Viking Age.

Coenwulf gold coin touring exhibition

The unique gold mancus of Coenwulf of Mercia was acquired by the
British Museum in 2006, and has featured in an extensive programme
of temporary exhibitions. Venues so far include the British Museum,
Norwich Castle Museum and the British Library, and the coin formed
the centrepiece of the collaborative exhibition Gold, Gods and
Kings: The Anglo-Saxons in Bedfordshire at Bedford Museum in
2007.

Tutbury Castle research project

This is a collaborative project with Tutbury Castle in
Staffordshire and the University of Birmingham, and covers the
history and archaeology of Tutbury Castle and the surrounding area,
including the Tutbury Hoard of 1831, the largest coin hoard ever
discovered in Britain. The project formed the subject of the
exhibition Ruin and rebellion: uncovering the past at Tutbury
Castle in Room 69a at the British Museum from July 2009 to
March 2010. Elements of this exhibition are now on display at
Tutbury Castle. The results of the research project were
published as a monograph in 2011.

Portraits in Gold and Silver

The exhibition Portraits in Gold and Silver: Coins and
Medals of the Tudors and Stuarts looks at the way that coins
and medals were used to present public images of English and
Scottish rulers from the l480s to the 1660s. The exhibition at
Tutbury Castle in Staffordshire is based around electrotype copies
of objects in the British Museum collection, and opened on April
13, 2009.

A Riverine Site in North Yorkshire

This site (the precise location of which remains a secret) came
to light in 2004 as a result of the discovery of a Viking hoard by
metal detectorists. It was subsequently investigated by the York
Archaeological Trust, and metal detecting has also revealed a large
assemblage of other objects, mostly dating from the Viking Age. The
site throws new light on exchange and bullion-economies at the very
beginning of the Viking settlement of England in the mid 870s. A
report on the site and finds was completed in February
2012, produced in collaboration by the British Musuem and the
York Archaeological Trust, and a more extended monograph on the
subject will go to press in early 2015.